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Chenchen, an Africa wood species with a long list of applications has an even longer list of names.

High grade chenchen with good color and an interesting grain pattern is used in high-end projects, such as architectural woodworking applications. Chenchen logs are large and generate a very good yield of material.

It offers a nice light color and is an attractive wood that can be stained. It is easy to go from dark to light with this wood. Lower grades are typically rotary cut, and used for backing in plywood.

Chenchen is not a mainstream veneer in the U.S. market, like cherry, makore or sapele.  In Africa, it is used extensively as a commodity wood. In addition to veneer and plywood, chenchen is used for furniture components and joinery. It is also used in light construction, and in boxes and crates.

In fact it is these industrial uses that may be giving chen chen some attention lately (interest has been trending up at WoodoftheMonth.com) - as a candidate for an alternate to balsa wood. So far chen chen is a fairly small-scale source of timber, but it yields a lightweight hardwood with density of 23 to 33 pounds per cubic foot (250-540 kilogram per cubic meter) - similar to balsa.

Shortages of balsa wood - used historically in model planes  - have been cropping up, perhaps because balsa is used in those very large wind turbine blades. They contain carefully arrayed strips of balsa wood from Ecuador, which provides 95 percent of the world’s supply. 

Chenchen wood peels very easily and evenly, so it is commonly used for veneer. It's mainly used for the panel industry in the United States and it's typically quartered.

It is sometimes referred to as blonde sapele because it has a similar ribbon stripe, but some have taken issue with another name for the tree, false iroko, because chenchen is relatively soft and lightweight while iroko is as hard as a rock.

Chechen is a cleaner wood than sapele - it doesn't have the pin knots that sapele can have. It is one of the more economical trees from Africa. It grows thick and fast and abundantly. Trees are so large - that a single tree can yield 200,000 square feet of veneer. 

Chenchen has found use in the U.S. for architectural panels and store fixtures. In Africa, chenchen it is mass produced in plywood and used for inexpensive furniture.

Chenchen grows throughout the high forest zones of West, Central and East Africa. In Ghana, it is known as kyenkyen and chenchen. In Tanzania, it is called mkuzu and mlulu. In Nigeria, it is oro and ogiovu, while in Uganda it is called kirundo and mumaka. In Senegal, it is known as ako. Another regional name is bark cloth tree - because the inner bark of the tree was used to make white cloth. Long ago, the trees were cut to make canoes.

Antiaris will season without difficulty but requires extreme care after the tree is cut, otherwise a blue stain will develop. The trees routinely grow to 100 feet or more and are easily distinguished because of their distinctive smooth bark, which ranges from pale, dirty white, to yellow, to pure white.†

The authors of Tropical Timbers of the World from the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service said that the wood seasons rapidly, but "there is a pronounced tendency to warp, particularly twisting." They suggest a kiln schedule of T2-D4 for 4/4 stock and T2-D3 for 8/4 stock.

†Source: Albert Constantine Jr., Know Your Woods